Christiane F.
|
Our Price: $39.00 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $32.29 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Canada
Movie Reviews of Christiane F.
Movie Review: An interesting film
Summary: 4 Stars
Relatively unknown in America, the street/drug scene in Germany in the 80's. I think a lot of Americans might find this interesting, especially those who have traveled. I enjoyed it.Movie Review: effective story
Summary: 4 Stars
Christiane F is an effective Story you will enjoy with that true story, its old film but the story is still happen now also in any where in that world.Movie Review: Powerful and Gripping! - Why No Subtitles?
Summary: 3 Stars
If you are interested in the substance abuse genre, this movie is the most realistic, powerful, and disturbing I've seen. Compare this to the likes of "Days of Wine and Roses", "The Man With the Golden Arm" and "28 Days", and the others all seem lame and glossed over. The only film that I thought came close to the level of realism of "Chrstiane F." was "Panic in Needle Park".This film takes you to the horrifying depths of heroin addiction, as excruciatingly experienced by a German teenager and her "friends". Based on a true story from the 1970's Berlin drug scene, the title character is from a dysfuntional family who eventually falls into the grips of heroin addiction and prostitution by age 14. Great soundtrack, with Bowie (I especially liked the version of Heroes that is sung partly in German), great depiction of the 70's club scene in Berlin, which was rampant with drug use. Even though in color, has the gritty feel of a noir. The film also captures dead-on the desperation of addiction, and how the addicts life becomes all about the next shot. The film also does a great job of conveying the depravity and desolation of the Berlin Zoo train station, a haven for prostitues and addicts at the time.
Based on a book of the same name (unfortunately, last I checked, the book was out of print), the movie of course does not go into as much detail (what movie based on a book does?) but nonetheless, this is a brutal, accurate portrait of the ravages of drug use.
Two things, if you can find the book, buy it. The book was riveting and goes into much greater depth of the girls family background, and her early drug use pre-heroin addiction. Also the movie condenses her many "cold turkey" episodes into one or two instances, and the true horror of her withdrawals are much more graphic and real in the book.
Secondly, I would have given this 5 stars if the movie were subtitled instead of dubbed. It takes a lot away from the film, and I would recommend waiting until it is released (hopefully) in German with subtitles. I was fortunate enough to have seen the film in the theatre in German with subtitles, and it made a big difference.
A classic movie of this genre, a must see, even with the dubbing!
Movie Review: 5 stars for the movie itself. 1 star for the DVD release.
Summary: 3 Stars
The good: the movie itself. Dark, depressing, gripping and well-done movie about teenage heroin addicts in late-'70s Berlin, based on the autobiography of the real-life Christiane F. Amazing performances from a cast that, believe it or not, were mostly non-actors, and a truly magnificent job of showing the horrors of addiction. Not to mention it's a priceless time capsule and period piece of Berlin during that time.
The bad: the DVD release, at least the Region 1 American version. A previous reviewer was on the mark in calling this "bare-bones." No director commentary, no special features, no updates on where the cast and/or the real-life people this film is based on are now, and not even subtitles. There is literally NOTHING on this DVD except for the original movie itself in German and an option to watch it in a truly awful English-language dub. If the dubbed English dialogue was the actual dialogue of a film, that film would rank up there with "From Justin to Kelly" or Vanilla Ice's "Cool as Ice" as one of the most moronic films of all time.
5 stars for the movie, 1 star for the DVD, for an average of 3 stars total.
Movie Review: Movie is good - DVD is bare-bones
Summary: 3 Stars
This is a gritty movie about one girl's experience in the Berlin underage prostitution/drug scene of the 70's. This is no glamorized Hollywood movie with mid-twenty year old actors as teens.This is a depressing movie, although ultimately it has a good ending, at least for Christiane.
I read the 5-star book years and years ago, and after buying the DVD a few months back, I wanted to re-read the book as it has much more detail, and more cycles of getting clean and relapsing than shown in the movie. The book is out of print (natch!), but it is worth checking out used-book stores for it.
The DVD has no extras at all, and as noted by others, no subtitles - you get it in original German, or second-rate dubbed English. I watch it both ways - German for the emotion, English for understanding.
Still, highly recommended for a change from the Hollywood usual. Much David Bowie in the soundtrack.